I believe that everything in life is a skill. If you are unsatisfied with some area of your life, chances are you lack a skill in that area.

Tip: Most books are available free at the Toronto Public Library.

For me, I lacked skills and knowledge in investing. Business school teaches you how to read a balance sheet, but they don’t teach you how to buy a stock. So I taught myself.

Learning investing is never really ‘urgent’ – most people wait until they’ve accumulated a bunch of wealth and then scramble to figure out what to do with it. Many people hire a financial advisor to figure it out for them. I decided to the opposite. I figured by learning all of this now, the moment I have a windfall of cash I will know what to do with it. I will be able to be my own financial advisor.

Besides that, every working professional has some edge on the market – doesn’t hurt to set aside a small amount for speculative plays 😉

.“If you read three books on any one topic, you are basically an expert compared to the general population”

I never win those case competitions at school – but here is a competition I thought we had a fair chance at. We presented to the President of IBM last week and won first place.

I made the most of EVERY opportunity this internship had to offer. I wore a suit & tie every single day. I volunteered to run the blog and published 7 posts. I read Thomas Watson’s biography on my spare time. The video unintentionally went viral at work. I published an editorial for Talentegg.ca. I don’t drink, but I still showed up to every social.

When my manager said he was gonna go verbally spar with a corporate lawyer over a multi-million dollar negotiation, I asked if I could just come and listen and he let me. He called the lawyer a cruel baby-seal clubber and still won the deal. We laughed.

Anytime someone said “I’d be happy to help, just reach out” or “I think you should talk to this person” I did just that, and followed-up to meet for a chat. It didn’t matter if that person was another intern, a manager, or an executive. They were worth the time and I prepared so I was worth their time.

An internship is often like university. You are not remembered for all the things you do in class, you are remembered for all the things you do outside of class. Be outstanding.

People don’t believe me when I tell them it took 50 hours of editing. It really did. Every subtitle, is handmade, every photo resized, every effect, manually added in. Though I admit most of the time spent was learning how to use the software, and experimenting with concepts.

The many, many drafts involved in the process.

I reverse-engineered how to make a viral video from online tutorials and put many elements of that into the piece below. I sent it out to three people for feedback prior to release (thank you very much to Roxine Kee who reviewed both the first and second drafts) and took their feedback to improve the piece.

The result?

10,000 views within 24 hours.

And to date: 23,000 views, 674 likes, and 132 shares.

The video was leaked to my workplace and received comment from the President of IBM Canada. The Dean of TRSM also left comment.

What I’m really proud about is all the shares. To create content that people feel like is worth talking about is a sure hallmark of success.

But anyway, the video speaks for itself. I am glad to capture this point of my life in a 4 minute video. You never know when it will come up in the future,

If I learned one thing from working in sales, it’s that persistence is key. Sometimes you are the right person, but simply are reaching out at the wrong time. You can’t give up on your first attempt.

I dedicate this photo to everyone who has applied to the same job twice.

Bonus points if the job website still has your old application on file, lol. Second time should be a charm as I am significantly more qualified (8 months of sales/marketing experience) than the last time.

There are a million personal development books out there these days, so it’s hard to sort the gems from the fluff. A heuristic to solve this is find authors who were the pioneers of their disciplines, and have written books that stood the test of time.

Brian Tracy (1944-) is like the Jedi Master (grey hair included) of self improvement books He’s a best selling author who’s wrote over 70 personal development books. Crazy right? But it shows he’s truly dedicated to his craft.

The first book of his that I read was Eat That Frog, which is a 100 page book which distills all the best personal development book into a simple paperback.

I prefer his writing over other authors since he is highly pragmatic, and focuses more on action rather than mindset.

Here’s an excerpt from another one of his books, Million Dollar Habits where he shares his inspiring background story.

When I could no longer find a laboring job, I got a job in straight commission sales, cold calling from door to door and office to office. For a long time, I was one sale away from homelessness. If I did not make a sale that day, and get my commission immediately so I could pay for my room at the boarding house, I would have been out on the street. This was not a great way to live.

Then one day I began asking the question, “Why is it that some people are more successful from others?” Especially, “Why is it that some salespeople are more successful than others?”

Looking for an answer to that one question, I did something that changed my life and began the formation of a habit that profoundly affected my future. I went and asked the most successful salesman in my company what he was doing different than I was. And he told me. And I did what he told me to do. And my sales went up.

I soon developed the habit of asking everyone, in every way possible, for the answers I needed to move ahead more rapidly. The Law of Cause and Effect states that every cause has an effect. If you do what other successful people do, you will eventually get the same results that they do. And if you don’t, you won’t.

Brian Tracy, Million Dollar Habits, 2004.

I relate to this story quite deeply because I remember one day while working last Summer, my roommate asked me if I could cover the grocery bill because he didn’t have enough money. He showed me his bank account statement with less than $10 in it. He had expected to make a sale that week, but didn’t. A week or so later, I also recall us high-fiving each other because we had both made a sale that day. and we went out to go eat Popeyes chicken together.

Brian Tracy tours the world speaking and teaching. I hope to catch him the next time he’s in Toronto!

When we graduate high school, our social circles disperse as everyone travels their own path in pursuit of finding their calling.

From time to time we cross paths with old classmates, but the conversations usually don’t last longer than a quick ‘hi’.

Last month I was struggling – and had two old classmates reach out to offer advice as they were both working in the same field. We rekindled high school memories, exchanged crazy customer stories, compared products, and finally compared commission pay rates.

Fast forward to last week. I get these guys flown out to BC. I give them the best two day training I can, and cook them fried bananas for breakfast. The result?

Chris closes a deal his first day working solo. Drops a 3-bomb in his second week.

Markus drops a 2-bomb in his first week and reaches 6 deals by 2 weeks.

Super proud to watch these guys tackle a new career opportunity and even surpass my abilities.

As I leave this job and return to school, the ‘Toronto underdog’ torch must be passed on – and I couldn’t be happier to pass it on to a couple of old classmates… that I never thought I’d be reunited with.

Photo: Customer named Natalie we helped out. She said the security and fire protection would give her peace of mind for when she travels, and the doorbell camera would help her screen the front door for strangers.

Before you even touch a door in BC, you have to get fingerprinted. They have pretty strict licensing out here. Without a license, I couldn’t work the first week. So I was paired up to work with my buddy Nova Mehta, the top rookie in Canada last season.

A Harold and Kumar working together, we had customers laughing out of their pants. Jokes like:

– “I’m here to set you up with a smart home, the asian guy is here to do your dishes”
– “Honestly tell me, which looks cooler, the white hat or the black hat?”
– “When you call for customer service, you get my direct line… you’re not talking to a call centre in India with one of this guy’s cousins”

Best part is, we closed a total of 8 deals in 8 days. There’s amazing consistency when you put great minds together.

Nova’s name made a reappearance, as Top #11 in all of Canada that week.

Now that the week is over and my license is in, I’m off to work solo for the 11 days I have left here.

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About Me:

My name is Ryan Ing and I’m a former business student at Ryerson University.

I started this blog to help other business students out there by sharing my career journey: the ups, the downs, but most importantly, the grind.

You’re not alone out there. You’re not the only one trying to land your dream job upon graduation. You’re not the only one reading books out there to get smarter. You’re not the only one grinding. So join me on this journey.